Priests suspected of sexually abusing children should be turned over to the authorities and face legal action, the Vatican said yesterday in a letter to bishops on anti-paedophilia guidelines.
The letter laid out provisional procedures for sex abuse crimes committed by priests and gave bishops a year to deliberate the proposals in the wake of a global scandal that has shaken the Roman Catholic Church to its very core.
“Sex abuse of minors is not just a canonical delict but also a crime prosecuted by civil law,” the letter said, stressing that civil law “should always be followed.”
“The Guidelines... seek to protect minors and to help victims in finding assistance and reconciliation,” the letter said, adding that it was up to bishops to notify the authorities regarding a suspected paedophile priest.
But victims’ groups, who have deplored the Vatican’s secrecy over sex crimes, slammed the guidelines as a “smoke screen signifying no change at all.”
The letter was published in English, French, German, Italian, Polish and Spanish, and urged bishops to ensure the Church gives “spiritual and psychological assistance” to victims and their families.
The guidelines “not only concern cases of abuse committed by clerics, but also those cases which involve religious or lay persons who function in ecclesiastical situations,” it said.
But the letter was dismissed before publication by the US victims’ group Survivors’ Network of those Abused by Priests (SNAP), which called for internationally binding policies instead of guidelines.
“We are very disappointed,” said David Clohessy of SNAP, adding that the guidelines were “belated and very grudging.”
“As an absolute minimum there should be a global no-tolerance policy,” he said. “Fundamentally the reason that Church officials ignore, conceal and mishandle sex crimes is because they can.”
Britain’s National Secular Society warned that the guidelines said bishops had to report cases to secular authorities only if they do not “prejudice” the “sacramental internal forum.”
“Which probably means cases should be heard, where it is possible, in secret under canon law, which provides for no more serious penalty than defrocking. And even that... only the most extreme cases,” it added in a press release.
The Vatican has come under intense pressure in recent years over paedophilia and the scandal of child-abuser priests peaked last year with a string of high-profile revelations in Belgium, Germany and Ireland.
The Holy See has been accused of being slow to out paedophile priests and last month Amnesty International said it was still failing to meet international obligations to protect children.